by Kelli Kimble
“What do you have to eat in your bag?” he asked.
“A few strips of jerky are left.” I pawed through the bag. “An apple. Are you thirsty? I still have water.”
“I don’t want to eat it. We need something that could be a lubricant.”
I fell silent. I didn’t have anything like that in my bag.
Port lifted his light behind the wheel and inspected the mechanism. “This whole thing is one big mess of rust,” he said. He traced his fingers over the parts.
The hairs on the back of my neck stood up, and I turned my attention to the darkness behind us. Had there been a sound? A soft scraping?
Port cleared his sinuses of mucous and spat it at the point where the wheel connected to the cranking mechanism.
“Ew,” I said.
He laughed. “Do you want to get out of here or not? Can you manage some?” He held his hand out.
“You want me to spit into your hand?”
“Yeah.”
I spit into his hand, and he rubbed it over the metal.
“We’re going to have to turn the wheel without the handle,” he instructed. “You take one side and pull up. I’ll pull down on the other side.”
We struggled to come to a position where each of us could get our hands on the wheel and still have the proper leverage to apply force. In the tight space, we had to interlace our legs.
“Ready?” asked Port. “On the count of three. One, two, three.”
I tried to pull the wheel upwards. It still didn’t move. We paused for a moment. There was a slight shuffle in the dark tunnel, and Port started.
“You heard it, too?” I said.
Port nodded. He pulled his light from around his neck and held it out, illuminating a few more feet of the tunnel. Something glinted in the light. “We’ve got to get this open,” he said. He threw the light-stick down the tunnel, and it bounced as it dispelled the darkness. There was the scramble of feet as whatever it was ran from the light. I had no doubt in my mind that it would soon find the courage to come closer, despite the light.
“Take a deep breath and pull!” said Port.
Again, I pushed upward, then reworked my grasp by moving one hand along the bottom of the wheel and pulling it towards me, while trying to push up with the other.
There was the slightest, almost imperceptible amount of give.
“Stop,” Port said.
I released a breath and panted. I glanced towards the light-stick. Beyond it, I thought I could see the faint glint of something shiny again. What was it?
“Okay, again,” Port instructed.
The wheel moved again; this time, a little farther. Bits of rust fell from the mechanism onto our legs. Then, with a screeching groan, the wheel began to move. We kept turning it, moving hand-over-hand to keep it going. The mechanism was raining down rust, and dust kicked up as the tired metal was forced through its paces.
The door began to lift. I could see a sliver of light. I was out of breath. Sweat was flowing down my forehead and dripping into my eyes, but I continued to turn the wheel with Port.
The door had inched open enough to get my fist under it. Fresh air came in, and I was shocked to realize how stale the air we’d been breathing was. The outside air wasn’t cool. If anything, it was warmer than the air inside the tunnel.
I glanced down the tunnel again but could see no sign of whatever I’d thought was back there, waiting to get us.
Port grunted. “Whatever it was, it doesn’t like the light. It’ll leave us alone now, if you need a break.”
I nodded and dropped my arms from the wheel. They’d started to feel weak. I took a drink of water and offered some to Port. He emptied the container, and I tucked it into my bag. It was the last of our water, and I hoped that once we got outside, we’d find a new source.
Port resumed turning the wheel, and after a few more minutes of rest, I joined him. If the hatch had been designed as an emergency exit, it certainly wasn’t good for the sort of emergency that required speed.
The door had finally lifted enough for Port to fit under it, so we gathered our things—including the light-stick that Port had thrown—and crawled under the door. The sun was directly overhead, and it baked the rock and sand around the exit door. There was a lever next to the door, and I pulled it. There was a click, and then a rapid clanging as the heavy door slammed shut. We wouldn’t be returning that way.
Surveying our position, I found we were maybe one-third up the mountain, between two narrow ridges. The ridges blocked our view of the sides of the mountain, and when I turned and looked up, the earth was humped up over the exit door in such a way that we would have had to walk a good hundred yards or more down the mountain to see above us.
“I’m a little uneasy,” I said.
“We’re too exposed here. We’ve got to get down the mountain,” he said.
We consulted the tablet for human heat signatures and after we were satisfied that all the nearby dots were inside the mountain, we began to descend.
The soil was sandy and rocky in some places, making it difficult to keep my footing. Port didn’t seem to notice and moved along easily. The sun baked the rock, making heat rise from beneath us, even as the sun melted us from above.
After an hour or so of walking, I started to get lightheaded. I stumbled quite a few times, and Port slowed his pace for me. The ridge to our left finally receded, and I could see the cover of trees in the distance.
“Should we head that way?” I asked, pointing to the trees.
Port shook his head. “No. It’ll be faster to descend straight down.”
I grasped at his arm and stopped.
“What is it?” he asked.
“I’m hot and tired, and I’m pretty sure I’m dehydrated. Won’t the cover of the trees protect us from this heat some? And maybe there’s water somewhere in there.”
He seemed to see me through his focus. “Geez, Fi. You look terrible.”
“I assure you, I feel even worse,” I said.
“All right. We’ll go towards the trees. I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were in such a state.”
We struck off towards the trees, angling across the mountain instead of taking the direct path. Port took my pack from me, and it gave me some relief. The only thing keeping me going was the promise of shade once we got under the trees.
By the time we reached them, Port was practically carrying me. The canopy dropped the temperature a good 10 degrees, and he helped me sit, propped up against the soft, mossy side of a tree.
He put my bag beside me. “I’m going to look for water. Don’t move, okay?”
I lifted one hand to wave him away. I couldn’t manage to form words, because my tongue felt glued to the roof of my mouth, and my lips were painfully cracked. I closed my eyes and felt him move away. With my eyes closed, there seemed to be nothing to do but sleep while I waited.
Chapter 8
I woke with a start. There was a noise. A loud noise. What was that?
It was night, and I couldn’t see anything. The trees that worked so well to block out the sun also blocked out the feebler light of the stars and the moon. I wanted to call out for Port, but I was afraid to draw attention to myself. Was Adam out there with his tanker gang?
I fumbled for my pack with shaking hands and withdrew the tablet. Even the two-dimensional display seemed impossibly bright. There weren’t any red dots. Only me. I put it back in my pack and waited for the spots in my vision to fade.
Scrambling, I rose to my feet. The rest I’d gotten and the cool of the night had helped, but I still felt weak and dizzy. I needed to find water. And Port. I closed my eyes and listened for any potential sounds of water. I could only hear the wind rustling the leaves.
What was that noise?
I pulled my pack over my shoulder and started to walk down the mountain, along the border of the woods. The moon was in its crescent phase and didn’t offer much light, but near the edge of the woods, I was able to pick my way th
rough the trees if I stepped carefully. I stopped every few minutes to listen for the sounds of water.
I did hear the sound again, though.
Despite my thirst and weakness, I broke into a run. Port had to be making that sound. I ran deeper into the woods, looking for the source. In the dark, it was difficult to know what I should have been looking for.
“Port,” I whispered, as loudly as I dared. “Is that you?”
Nobody answered. The wind blew, and I heard the sound again. It was loud and sharp, like a bang.
I was getting closer. I kept going, and right above me, I heard it again. I jumped and backed myself against a large tree. I couldn’t see the source. A breeze blew again, and the leaves parted just enough for me to find it—a tree trunk. The trunk was split down the seam of two large branches, and when the wind blew, it pulled the pieces apart. Then, when the tension was too much, they snapped back together with a loud crack.
The air whooshed out of me. It was nothing. Harmless. And anyway, what was I thinking? Believing the sound was Port? If it was, he would have shown up on my tablet. I consulted the tablet again and found no red dots. But I did get the idea that if I used the three-dimensional map, I could perhaps find water.
The map leapt from the screen, illuminating where water might be running down the mountain. I just needed to keep moving, down and slightly to my left.
I put away the tablet and started moving. I needed water before daybreak; otherwise, the heat would probably finish me off, even under the protection of the trees. I forced my legs to keep moving, and in only a few more minutes, I heard running water. I stumbled forward, and in my haste, I almost stepped right into it. I dropped to my knees and put my face in it, drawing in as much as I could.
It was cool and felt sharp against the sores that had developed on my tongue. I drank until my stomach sloshed, then got out my water canteen and filled it for later. Out of energy, I crawled to a nearby tree and fell asleep on the bed of dead leaves beneath it.
◆◆◆
The birds woke me before the sun did. I wiped the crust from my eyes and sat up. The forest floor was mossy, with a soft covering of leaves. It was the sort of place I might have believed fairies lived in when I was small—if anyone had told me fairy stories, that is.
I winced as I stood. My back and knees were sore from crawling through the tunnel yesterday. I went back to the stream and splashed some water on my face. I needed to check the tablet and find Port. Maybe he was back where he’d left me, looking for me.
I got out the tablet and tried to work out where he’d left me when he’d gone to look for water. It couldn’t have been far, since I’d heard the sound of the split tree from there. Maybe half a mile, at the farthest. The only dot on the map was me. Even the people inside the mountain weren’t close enough anymore. Where could he be?
I decided that it only made sense for him to have gone farther down the mountain, and after chewing on a piece of beef jerky, I set out in that direction. I followed the stream, since I knew it would naturally descend.
About every half-hour, I checked the map. At noon, I reached the bottom of the mountain, and I began the long walk to skirt it. Still, I saw no signs that Port had been there—or anyone at all. I stopped to rest in the middle of the afternoon when I found a berry patch. I sat on a rock, eating berries and sipping from my canteen. I had juice on my fingers, and I tried not to think about how much it looked like blood.
I continued towards the village. I was beginning to wonder if Adam and the others were really looking for me. By noon the next morning, I saw the village in the distance. Everything looked peaceful.
When I finally entered the village, I was glad to find my house still standing, and Oliver and Helen inside, working at the loom.
“Master Fiona,” said Helen. “Where’ve you been? Everyone’s been worried about you.”
I ignored her question. “Have you seen Davenport? Has he been here?”
“No,” said Oliver. “We thought he was with you.”
“He was.” I sat on the edge of the bed and pulled my boots off. “Can one of you run and fetch Charity? And the other of you, I could use something to eat that isn’t jerky or berries.”
The two ran from the house, their enthusiasm to please showing. Helen returned first with a bowl of stew. Hot food had never tasted so good. My concern for Port was wrenching my stomach, and it didn’t sit well.
Helen lurked around the end of the bed. “Are you all right?” she asked when I set the bowl down. She rushed to retrieve it from me.
“I’ll be fine. I’m just worried about Port. He should have been back by now.”
“You’ve been gone for four days. What happened? My mother said you were only going to see the president and come back.”
I turned away. “The president’s dead. And the person in his place is worse than he was.”
Helen’s face paled.
I reached for her hand. “I’m sorry, Helen. I didn’t mean to frighten you.”
“It would be stupid of me not to be frightened.”
There was a knock, and then Charity and Oliver entered. She took one look at me and dismissed the children. “I think you two have done enough work for the day. You can go on home now,” she said.
Oliver nodded his appreciation and ducked quickly out the door.
Helen lingered for a moment more. “Is there anything I can do for you, Master Fiona?” she asked.
“Thank you, Helen, but no. It’s enough that you’re thinking of me.”
Helen smiled at the floor, tucked her long hair behind her ear, and backed out the door.
“Where were you?” asked Charity. “The whole village is talking. We thought you were dead.”
“No,” I said. “I’m not dead.”
“Where’s Port?”
The calm I’d felt entering my own home faded. “I don’t know. I was hoping that you did.”
Charity shook her head. “We haven’t heard from him since you two left. Where have you been, Fiona? What took so long?”
“Leo’s dead.”
She shrugged. “Okay, so who’s next in line?”
“His name is Adam,” I said. I flopped backwards onto the bed and covered my face. “He wants us all dead.”
“What?”
“He wants the village for himself, and all our resources. He doesn’t want us. And he doesn’t just want us to go away. That would be too easy and would allow us to retaliate.”
The bed sank as Charity sat beside me. “That’s bad,” she said.
“Yeah.”
“And they have Port? Did they capture him?”
“I don’t know. A friend helped us out of the mountain, and we were hiking home. I got dehydrated and had to stop and rest. He went to find water and never came back.”
“How long did you wait?”
I shot a glare at her. “You think I didn’t think of that? That he came back for me, and I wasn’t there? No. He was more than a mile away from me, or he was. . .” I trailed off when I thought about the other way he might not have shown up on my tablet. If he wasn’t warm, he was cold.
“Was what?” prompted Charity.
“He was either more than a mile away from me or dead.”
“Oh.”
We sat in silence. She took my hand, and I let her hold it. I needed her to hold it.
Eventually, she broke the silence. “How do you know that, exactly?”
“Swen gave me a tablet. He showed me how to use it to monitor for a human-range body temperature inside a one-mile radius.”
“Why would you need to watch for human bodies?”
The whole story spilled out of me. Being shown to Leo’s dead body, being held captive, eating with the tankers, Willow’s help, and our escape. It felt good to offload it to someone else—to remove it from my person, like a squirrel scratching off a flea.
Only, it was still inside me, and it wouldn’t go away.
“We have to find him,” said Ch
arity.
“I haven’t the first idea where to look,” I said. “He would try to come here. Where else would he go?”
“What about your mom’s? Would he go there?”
“Maybe. We should check there,” I said. I sat up, and I realized I was in no shape to hike over there yet.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “I can tell from your face that you need some rest. I’ll send someone over to look for him. You just curl up and try to get some sleep. Okay?” She knelt in front of me and swung my legs onto the bed, then covered me with a blanket. “You just get some rest. You’ve been through a lot, and you need it. Okay? Promise me that you’ll rest.”
I crawled towards my pillow, dragging the blanket with me. I didn’t even care that my filthy clothes were probably ruining the bedding I was lying on. “I promise,” I said.
I was asleep before she shut the door behind her.
Chapter 9
Later, after I’d washed up, I went to get something to eat. My stomach was tied in knots from not knowing where Port was, but I had to eat something.
The hall had few people in it, since it was mid-afternoon. The few people there stared openly when I entered.
Charity was among them, and she came to sit with me. “I just heard back from the other village. Port’s not there, but Adam is. He’s talking with your mother. Marty went to see her. He was turned away.”
“Adam is there?” A tiny shiver went down my spine. My mother had the welfare of her own people in mind and—unlike me—she had the stomach to do what she had to do to keep them safe.
“Yes. And a few others. The guard didn’t count them, but he said it was fewer than a dozen. He said they planned to be there all afternoon and that your mother shouldn’t be disturbed. What do you make of it?”
“It can’t be good,” I said.
She nodded.
“I should go there,” I realized. “To see what she has planned.”
“We both know that’s a bad idea,” she said.
